Health Recovery and our Stinkin’ Thinkin’

"We cannot solve our problems with the same level of thinking that created them."

— Albert Einstein

We cannot address our epidemics of sickness and disease with the same definitions, superficial adjustments, failed philosophies, diagnoses, treatments, procedures, techniques, or individualized health models that have fallen short.

To move forward, we must ask new questions, listen to the answers, and view health through a fresh lens—one that embraces context and the needs of whole human beings. Our spirits, hearts, minds, bodies, and relationships require nourishment too, just as much as our physical selves need good food. Perhaps then we’ll see how external tweaks, even the best “health” advice, and an isolated, individual-focused approach have failed most people.

By asking different questions, exploring new perspectives, and truly engaging with the reality of those who are exhausted, stressed, depressed, confused, and overwhelmed by daily struggles, we might reach new conclusions.

Yes, there are practical steps we must take to give people a fighting chance. Beyond that, we can help our families, friends, and neighbors remember how we’re designed to be deeply nourished by love, truth, and beauty—through community, nature, and the personal relationships we share with ourselves, others, and the world.

Health isn’t just an outcome; it’s a daily practice that honors and strengthens our connection as breathing, feeling, thinking, moving, and relational beings. Faith, emotions, thoughts, actions, and interactions all play a role in cultivating and sustaining it.

We can—and must—work together to revive truth, redeem our thinking, and restore love in our daily lives and communities. Let’s find creative ways to nurture the connection between our spirits, hearts, minds, bodies, and relationships. Together, we can reconcile our scattered parts, simplify the overwhelming array of choices and demands, and renew trust in our sacred, beautiful human design

Is health political?

I have worried about what would happen when “health” becomes associated with a specific political party—especially when we haven’t considered how our health is affected by all politics and political parties.

From how our soil is understood and used to choosing when, how, where, what, and why we eat, we are making choices (whether we realize it or not) that are not only political but also spiritual, agricultural, ethical, environmental, moral, and cultural. Many have argued that what we do—and don’t do—in our daily, ordinary lives communicates far more about (D) all the above than what we say and how we vote.

When it comes specifically to “health,” we must remember that our health is interconnected, interrelated, and interdependent. Our individual and collective health reflects and is shaped by both a liberal and conservative understanding of who we are and how we are designed to live as receivers and givers of Life, Love, Truth, Hope, Joy, and Wisdom.

For our health to flourish, we must be disciplined in how we live and gracious in how we love, forgive, and share. Knowing when to conserve and when to liberate is the essence of honoring and strengthening—or dishonoring and weakening —our health with our thoughts, words, and deeds.

Oftentimes, I have said the most spiritual thing one can do is be a healthy, whole, holy human being. Today, I am adding to that and saying, “The most political thing you can do is be a healthy, whole, holy human being.” The efforts needed to be and become the people God calls us to be will require all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. And it is also a must if we are to love our neighbors as ourselves.

The truth is, we are living in a health crisis. It affects us all and touches every area of our lives. I pray that we can create the space, take a breath, listen attentively, ask new questions, look at ourselves and how we touch the people we know and places we live.

I do not believe for one second that the government, an institution, or a political party can save us from ourselves or address the root cause of our suffering and despair. They can help, but they are not God. It is up to each one of us to seek the Truth and examine our own hearts and lives.

I truly believe the healthiest people I know love the most. Love is the healing stream that flows to nourish our spirits, hearts, minds, bodies and relationships. Love flows through our connections to help and heal. The heart of health really is love.

No… We cannot “make America” healthy, but each one of us can participate in strengthening our health by honoring the gift of life we all share.

Remember what Wendell Berry said:

“Connection is health. And what our society does its best to disguise from us is how ordinary, how commonly attainable, health is. We lose our health - and create profitable diseases and dependences - by failing to see the direct connections between living and eating, eating and working, working and loving.”

For furthering reading: WENDELL BERRY: THE PLEASURES OF EATING

“There is, then, a politics of food that, like any politics, involves our freedom. We still (sometimes) remember that we cannot be free if our minds and voices are controlled by someone else. But we have neglected to understand that we cannot be free if our food and its sources are controlled by someone else. The condition of the passive consumer of food is not a democratic condition. One reason to eat responsibly is to live free.”

Out of context health advice

All the health advice- needs to be placed in context. The health conversation I have witnessed, followed (most my life) and regurgitated for 15 years, is so fragmented.

Usually, the best tips, hacks and information are reduced to the lowest common denominator like what we should or should not eat, or how many grams, steps, cups, minutes, and calories are needed to “be healthy.”

Yet, all the great thinkers and writers, like (my favorite) Wendell Berry, have known health is bigger, wider, and deeper than we can imagine, and it is nourished and sustained by so much more than external tinkering.

How many of us have known people who never saw their health as anything more than a gift- sustained by God, and nourished by work, worship, service, kindness and thrift.

For example: Take my great grandmother and both my grandmothers. They lived past 80, never counted protein grams or lifted weights. They lived simply, did everything themselves until they couldn’t. They also cooked pretty much every meal, didn’t eat out very often- worked, took care of their yards, cleaned their houses, planted flowers, and went to church.

They sewed, quilted, and crocheted. Lived in the same houses most of their lives. They drove used cars, and saved a whole lot of money by not spending money. Sure, they ate meat and eggs but they sure didn’t eat much. They did not drink alcohol or sodas, smoke, or eat lots of processed food. They also didn’t take supplements and weren’t on loads of prescriptions.

So, what was their key to “health” and longevity? Was it their spirituality, lifestyle, can do attitude or something they ate or did not eat? Hard to know and impossible to pull one thing out without everything including God’s providence connected to it.

Today- I am thankful for all the grandmothers, grandfathers and great grandparents who knew how to meet life on life’s terms. They weren’t perfect but they did seem to have a resilience and understanding of life that we have lost.

Here’s my great-grandmother. She crocheted more than a 100 afghans, raised four kids by herself, knew loss, worked hard, lived small, ate simply, laughed a lot and NEVER WONDERED IF SHE WAS EATING ENOUGH PROTEIN. She almost made it to 100.

Where does Health begin?

Where does health begin? It begins with remembering who we are and how we are designed to be deeply nourished by love, truth, and beauty through our personal relationships with ourselves, others, and our world. Health is not a result; it is the daily practice of wholeness and holiness. It’s time for the resurrection of truth and a recovery of love for our spirits, hearts, minds, and bodies. It’s time to renew our understanding and revive our trust in the human design. I invite you to join me in remembering how you are designed to Breathe, Listen, Ask, Look, and Touch Life.

What’s at the heart of our health crisis?

A Deliberation: How Might We Help Americans Recover Health?

What if health isn’t what we’ve been told—a number on a scale, a pill in a bottle, a fight against a failing body—but something else entirely? What if it’s who we are and how we are naturally designed—holy, whole, gifts created by a joyful God to live in a “we,” not an “I”? What if every initiative, every expert, every gadget promising to save us has faltered, not because they lack power, but because they aim at the wrong mark. They see a broken “me” when the truth is a scattered “we”—humans, creatures, earth, aching for connection, not correction. What if the chronic disease epidemic—kids on insulin, adults on edge, land on fumes—isn’t a failure of medicine, but a cry of a reality we’ve refused to see?

Consider this: we’re not unhealthy; we’re not unholy—but we have we participated in desecrating what God made sacred. Wendell Berry whispers it: “The grace that is the health of creatures can only be held in common.” What if health isn’t mine to fix, but ours to live—together, face-to-face, in a community that breathes? Picture a place where you’re seen, known—not a profile, but a person—where hands dig dirt with neighbors, where meals aren’t gulped alone but shared with laughter. What if that’s health—not a cure, but a coming home —a re-membering.

But here’s the rub: we can’t see it. Our eyes are blinded—by screens that shrink the “we” to “me,” by cities that trade soil for concrete, by a diagnosis too timid to name the rift. What if the first step isn’t a program, but a clearing—a chance to see our reality? Not the system’s lie—“You’re broken, buy this”—but God’s truth: “You’re holy, live this.” What if we paused, looked, asked: “Who’s telling me who I am?” Not the ads, not the apps, but the One who says, “You’re Mine—Blessed, Beloved, Whole.” What if that awareness cracked the lie wide open?

Now, if health is connection of the “we”—a living, loving community—how do we recover it? Not by prescribing or following a formula—God forbid we mimic the system—but by offering rest, honor, and help. What if we invited folks to a table—not a clinic—where bread’s broken, stories are told, and the earth’s gifts (not junk) feed us? What if gathered together in a field—not a gym—where work’s shared, sweat’s real, and the “we” grows food, not profits? What if we looked at the stars—not screens—where we worship the Creator as a “we,” not an “I,” and rest is a grace, not a guilt?

Health is weakened because we lack material intelligence and practical skills—it’s buried because we’ve traded meaningful work for convenience. What if we relearned the practical—how to grow, cook, mend—with others, not alone? Berry says, “Good work finds the way between pride and despair”—what if that work, done together, is health? Not pride’s lonely tech, not despair’s cheap fixes, but hands joined, cultivating a “we” that remembers who we are—holy gifts, not broken things.

And what of our places? “There are no unsacred places,” Berry insists, “only sacred places and desecrated ones.” What if health waits where the “we” lives—near dirt, near kin—not in sterile cubicles cut off from life? Imagine moving closer—literally, figuratively—to the “we,” to Creation. What if kids played in mud, not in a digital world, and adults worked with hands, not keyboards? What if it’s our gathering places “where” we can let us lose the “I” and find the “we” again and again—health now appears as the dance of that finding, of the mingling of the many?

What if it health does not change by prescribing a pill—but by remembering who we are and how we are naturally designed to be healthy, whole, holy human beings?. What if Americans recovered health by seeing what we have neglected- what we have trashed—not to shame but make us aware of the damage done? What if we asked, “How am I designed?” and heard, “For this—relationship, gifts, community.” What if we lived it—not to “get” health, but because we are— held in a community that’s bigger than “me”? The epidemic’s not a mystery—it’s a desecration of that truth. What if we were helped not just to see it but live it, not as duty, but as joy?

Ponder this: no system saves us—it’s too proud, too lonely. Health’s the “we” restored—not by force, but by invitation. What if we—started there, with one table, one field, one community? What if that’s enough to start to recover everything we have lost?